A flaw Microsoft's Bing cashback program allowed startup co-founder Samir Meghani get credit for over $2,000 in rebate cash through fake purchases.

Thomas Claburn, Editor at Large, Enterprise Mobility

November 10, 2009

2 Min Read

Attorneys for Microsoft on Friday sent a letter to Samir Meghani, co-founder of price-comparison search engine Bountii.com, demanding that he remove a blog post containing information about generating fake Bing cashback payments.

Bing cashback is a search marketing program that provides online shoppers with cash rebate credit for purchases made through use of Microsoft's Bing search engine. It is a cost-per-acquisition program that allows merchants to specify the amount of promotional funds paid to Microsoft as a sales commission. Microsoft, which operates the program to promote Bing, then passes 100% of the commission to shoppers.

Bing users can earn up to $2,500 annually this way. A 60-day waiting period is required prior to disbursement.

To participate, merchants have the option of using one of two reporting mechanisms, pixel tracking or batch feed. The pixel tracking method isn't as reliable but allows cashback credits to appear immediately in customers' accounts rather than a day after the purchase.

In a blog post last Wednesday, Meghani outlined what he described as "an obvious flaw" in the pixel tracking implementation.

"Anyone can simulate the tracking pixel requests and post fake transactions to Bing," he wrote. "I'm not going to explain exactly how to generate the fake requests so that they actually post, but it's not complicated."

Meghani said that Bing didn't appear to be able to detect fake transactions immediately. He said that he has never bought anything using Bing cashback. Nonetheless, he said that his account showed a balance of $2080.06, the rebate total for two fake $1 orders placed in January and fake orders amounting to $104,000 in October.

Meghani also pointed out that Microsoft's Bing cashback implementation has another security flaw, relying on order IDs in a predictable series. The flaw could allow a malicious user to deny cashback rebates to legitimate users by using up available order ID numbers.

Meghani did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Following receipt of a cease-and-desist letter from Microsoft's legal representatives, Meghani on Saturday said in a blog post that he had complied with Microsoft's demand and removed the post about Bing's cashback flaw.

He also said that Microsoft has closed his Bing cashback account.

"The purpose of my post was to show an implementation problem, not to encourage defrauding Microsoft," he wrote. "I am surprised they would go through this much trouble to make me take down information that is obvious to anyone reading their documentation. I don't like dealing with lawyers, so I've decided to comply with their request."

A Microsoft representative did not respond to a request for comment.

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About the Author(s)

Thomas Claburn

Editor at Large, Enterprise Mobility

Thomas Claburn has been writing about business and technology since 1996, for publications such as New Architect, PC Computing, InformationWeek, Salon, Wired, and Ziff Davis Smart Business. Before that, he worked in film and television, having earned a not particularly useful master's degree in film production. He wrote the original treatment for 3DO's Killing Time, a short story that appeared in On Spec, and the screenplay for an independent film called The Hanged Man, which he would later direct. He's the author of a science fiction novel, Reflecting Fires, and a sadly neglected blog, Lot 49. His iPhone game, Blocfall, is available through the iTunes App Store. His wife is a talented jazz singer; he does not sing, which is for the best.

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